FLIGHT International, 8 May 1969 745
THE EDWARDS REPORT
THERE ARE ABOUT 300,000 words plus. 38 appendices in the report of the Edwards Committee, appointed in July 1967 by the President of the Board of Trade to enquire into
the British air transport industry.
Here we present the main recommendations, as listed at
the end of each chapter of the report, together with Flight
extracts from the body of the report We have rearranged the
sequence of some chapters.
This historic document was published on May 2 at a cost
to the taxpayer of £43,285 and is obtainable from HM
Stationery Office at £1 15s per copy.
Principal recommendations
The Committee regards the following as its principal
proposals: —
(1) The Government should promulgate, by statutory
instrument from time to time as necessary, clear statements of
civil aviation policy indicating the importance to be attached
to the various objectives.
(2) The primary long-term objective should be to satisfy the
individual customer at the lowest price consistent with an
economic return on the investment and a level of safety
equal to the best in the world. Short-term policy must, however,
reflect the country's urgent balance of payments problems.
(3) British civil aviation in the 1970s should include a public
sector, a mixed sector and a private sector.
(4) The State Corporations should be confirmed in their role
as the major operators of British scheduled air services and
should also engage in inclusive tour and charter operations.
The public sector should, however, be reorganised with a
National Air Holdings Board having financial and policy
control over BOAC and BEA. The objective would be to ensure
the most effective deployment of operating facilities, marketing
strength and traffic rights.
(5) BOAC and BEA should retain their individual identities.
There should be safeguards to avoid over-centralisation in the
Holdings Board, a majority of whose members would also be
on the boards of one of the Corporations or BAS.
(6) BAS should be developed as a group of mixed owner
ship regional airlines for domestic routes (excluding the trunk
routes) with some continental connections. Some subsidy is
justified for certain domestic routes on grounds of regional
policy. The public investment would be held by the National
Air Holdings Board.
(7) The private sector should be encouraged to create a
"second force" airline, which should be licensed to operate a
viable network, covering scheduled and inclusive tour/charter
traffic, both long-haul and short-haul. Where it is decided to
license a second British operator on a route it should be this
"second force" airline. It must be financially and managerially
strong, should embrace more than one of the existing airlines
and will probably take time to arrange. Viability will require
some limited concession of Corporation territory. In exchange,
and according to the size of the concession, the National Air
Holdings Board should be entitled to take a financial stake in
convertible loan stock or equity and also to appoint one or
more directors to the "second force."
(8) There will be room for other private airlines in inclusive
tour and other passenger and freight charter operations where
licensing and tariff regulation policies should be liberal. There
will be increasing need for financial and managerial strength
to maintain safe and efficient operations and we envisage
fewer private airlines than the present number.
(9) The private sector should be given a fair opportunity;
no one should be forced to sell out to the State, equally no
one should be bought out at more than true worth.
(10) Good staff relations are essential to morale, efficiency and
safety, and recommendations are made for improvements.
The Government statements of policy should constitute the
terms of reference of a new statutory Civil Aviation Authority.
This Authority would be responsible for the economic- and
British Air Transport
in the Seventies
Report of the Committee of Inquiry
into Civil Air Transport
Chairman
Professor Sir Ronald Edwards KBE
Prtxnted to Parliament by the President of the Board of Trade
by Command of Her Ma)esty i
Mar IrW
LONDON
HER MAJESTY'S STATIONERY OFFICE
£1 IS*. M. Ml
Onnd.WB
safety regulatory functions at present dispersed between the
ATLB, the Board of Trade and the ARB. It should also be
responsible for the civil side of the joint National Air
Traffic Control Services, for operational research, for long-term
airport planning and for the main work of traffic rights
negotiation.
The air transport business is changing substantially and
rapidly. Holiday and personal travel is becoming increasingly
important; the patterns of traffic and operating techniques will
also continue to change. This will call for reappraisal of the
roles of scheduled and non-scheduled operations and of pricing
and of price control. The Civil Aviation Authority should
use its influence in favour of flexibility and experiment. Com
petition should be regulated to the extent necessary to achieve
the purposes of public policy, within the institutional and inter
national framework.
The financial and managerial resources of airlines should be
thoroughly probed and monitored by the Authority on
grounds inter alia of stability and safety.
A commentary
In the course of our investigations we have travelled widely
to visit major airlines, Governments and independent authorities
who have all shown a lively and helpful interest in our inquiry.
Most of the problems that we have found difficult are also
found difficult in other countries. We have therefore brought
back no talisman; indeed had it been possible for us to do so
it would have been a black mark against the British civil
aviation authorities and the airline industry. The airline
business is highly international; news travels fast. If there were
valuable tips to be picked up they were unlikely to be left
lying around waiting for the Edwards Committee.
We have become aware of three factors which added to the
difficulty of this inquiry. First, the rate of growth of air
transport has often been underestimated, and some of the
major developments have not been foreseen. There is no reason
to suppose that we in our turn will be more prescient than
others have been in the past. Certainly we think it would be
unwise to base proposals on such an assumption. We have
therefore sought to avoid recommendations that would make
for rigidity; indeed we aim at flexibility, both of organisation.
and attitudes.